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REV. MR BINGHAM'S 



THANKSGIVING DISCOURSE. 



M D C C C L X I V. 



Great Providences toioard the Loyal 
Part of this Nation. 



DISCOURSE 



DELIVEKED AT A UNITED SERVICE OF THE SEVEN I'KKSBYTKKIAN 
CONGREGATIONS OF BUFFALO, 



NOVEMBER 24, 1804, ON OCCASION OF THE 



ANNUAL THANKSGIVING 



BOTH OF TUB STATE AND OF THE NATION. 



BY JOEL F. BINGHAM, 



4ST0R OF WBSTMINSTKR CONGREGATION. 



BUFFALO : 
BREED, BUTLER AND COMBANY. 






GQ 



FRANKLIN PRINTING HOUSE. 

THOMAS, TYPOGBAPHKB. 



DISCOURSE. 



THE LORD HATH DONE GREAT THINGS FOR US J WHEREOF WE ARE 
GLAD. — PSALM CXXVL 3. 



Great or small in an estimate of favors is a 
judgment which does not rest altogether upon 
the accredited measures of material value here 
below, but involves also considerations lying 
quite apart from the operation of any commer- 
cial standard. The gifts which we receive 
and the services that arc done as tokens of 
interest and affection in our behalf possess, in 
the estimation of all intelligent and well-dis- 
posed persons, a second and superadded value 
which is quite independent of their price in 
the market. 

This thought should lie at the bottom of our 
gratitude to-day ; let us linger for a moment to 



Aveig'li its significance. When a widowed mo- 
ther fighting feebly with poverty has contrived 
by incessant toil and many a stern self-denial to 
secure year by year for her darling little son 
the scanty and homely articles of his slender 
wardrobe and a bare sufficiency of the plainest 
food, till his hands have grown strong for labor 
and his mind has matured to contrive for him- 
self and for her; in after years when that 
maternal form is resting from labors and has 
even mouldered back to dust in its narrow bed, 
unless human feeling has died also in his hard- 
ened bosom, unless he has become recreant 
to all the nobler sentiments which are inbred 
in our common nature, those homely garments 
put together of many a piece by the loving 
fingers of a worn and weary mother and those 
plain meals procured by the supremest exer- 
tions of a self-martyred affection will appear 
to his fond recollections a thousand times more 
precious, than the gayest apparel of fashion 
and the most luxurious viands which gold 
could l)uy in the markets of a heartless world, 
it is not a mere fancy of which we here speak. 
The ((uality wliich enriches that poor food and 
gilds that plain apparel is not a delusion of the 



imagination. This kind of value has a solid 
reality; and it is one of the rarest treasures 
we shall ever meet with in the whole course 
of our existence. A mother's unselfish love, 
and that whole rank of priceless sympathies of 
which it is the purest and the brightest earthly 
type, are, fortunately, a glorious reality, and a 
boon upon our imperfect condition here below, 
which is neither sold in any market, nor to 
be bought with gold. 

Now if you will exalt this quality in your 
conceptions, till it shall be pure enough and 
universal enough to be an attribute of our 
heavenly Father's heart, you will have arrived 
at the thought which, as we said, ought to be 
fundamental in our thankful reflections to-day. 
From this point of view, it would be strange, if 
many favors of His providence which we have 
been wont to overlook, or look upon as trifling 
matters, should not assume a new magnitude 
in our eyes, and all the infinitude of His do- 
ings of goodness should not be overlayed with 
the gladdening charm of a new and unspeak- 
able sweetness. The smallest gifts, gilded with 
a heavenly Father's thoughtful and untiring 
love, would appear great things indeed ; and 



the discovery would ease many a cliafing dis- 
satisfaction and brighten every allotment, per 
sonal, social, national. For though the figure 
which we have cited and are now about to 
dismiss l)e the nearest similitude that earth 
can afford, nevertheless, it fades utterly away. 
He declares, in the comparison with the actual 
reality of His own measureless, tireless parental 
care. " Can a woman forget her sucking child, 
tliat she should not have compassion on the son 
of her ivomh ? Yea they may forget, yet ivill 
not I forget thee.'' 

Since last we met in this annual convocation, 
three hundred and sixty new pages in the un- 
folding journal of Providence have been devel- 
oped to each of us and written out with 
unseen fingers for eternity. Here are recorded 
certain general blessings — upon which for the 
reasons soon to be stated we can only touch 
to-day — that have descended upon us in com- 
mon with all our fellow men in every part of 
the world, from the parental Hand above. 

Although it is little that some of us may 
think of it, it is written on those now invisible 
pages for a testimony to the goodness of God, 
how our constantly returning hunger and na- 



kediiCHs (Did Vied of our ivives and children has 
been supplied and these perishing bodies nour- 
ished and covered — not by our money, wliicli, 
left to itself, would soon leave us to i)erisli — 
not by our labor, whieh is but running to help 
ourselves from the cril) and the wardrobe of 
the Almighty — not by our sagacity or anxious 
thought, which could not bring one fertilizing 
summer shower across our meadows, nor arrest 
the ravages of a little insect in our fields, nor 
stay the spreading plague that should sweep 
our herds and flocks clean from the face 
of the earth — but by the sleepless thought 
of Him " luho careth for us,'' and from the 
unfailing bounty of Him ''who openeth His 
hand, and satisfieth the desire of every living 
things 

On each page of that imperishable diary is 
written, also, a series of 'p)ersonal incidents 
which in great part are unknown even, here 
below, except to the individual and to God, 
but which testify now in the secret of each 
heart, and when, as we are told, every secret 
shall be manifested, will testify also in the 
grand auditory of the universe, how the Un- 
seen Hand guided in mercy our individual 



steps, each in a differont but blessed way, 
tlirou^'li tlie whole clieekered scene. 

()li, it is not a little tliinc^, also, though the 
most forgotten of all, that the Hand which 
holds back the day of doom, until its appointed 
hour, has extended to the thousand millions of 
the fallen race, as well as to each one of us 
in particular, another year of that heavenly grace 
which is lyroclaimed under the Gospel of a 
Divine Redeemer ! 

But these general themes and such as these, 
brimming as they are with parental tenderness 
from above, but suited alike to all mankind, 
may, we think, wisely and well be absorbed, 
for the present moment, in a more special and 
pressing call for gratitude and praise — may 
wisely and well become almost inaudible, to- 
day, beneath the tones of a more domestic, 
extraordinary, national rejoicing. We hope to 
convince you, fellow-citizens, if you are not 
already convinced of it, that we were never 
before assembled to perform these exercises of 
public gratitude to God — that a similar as- 
sembly was never before convened on this 
American continent, when the peculiar and 
extraordinary national favors of a past twelve- 



9 

month, or of a past quadrennium, have called 
for so thoughtful niul so devoutly jiil)ilant a 
spirit of thanksgiving, as do the great things 
which the Lord has done for this nation de- 
mand of us to-day. 

Our principal thought will be di-awn from a 
comparison between tlie opposite Providential 
allotments of ourselves and our opi?onents in 
the present contest of arms. We speak of this 
fortunate difference of position in the light of 
a Providential allotment, because we are bound 
to remember that the masses of the Southern 
people, however earnestly they may now de- 
sire the success of their mistaken cause, are in 
fact ranged to-day on that side of the struggle, 
only because, by the inscrutable appointment 
of Him " ivho hath fixed the hounds of their 
habitation,'' their dwellings were found within 
the limits of a territory lying under the power 
of those malign forces which were at last suc- 
cessful in carrying those dwellings, with all 
the precious objects they contained, into the 
posture of rebellion and of a rival independ- 
ence. The masses of the people and public 
sentiment, everywhere, are controlled by a 
comparatively few persons, and above and be- 



10 

yoiul them, even, by principles, traditions and 
a combination of intangible and incalculable 
forces which seem almost to spring out of the 
soil, permeating the whole atmosphere that 
rests upon it, and which men inhale, as it were, 
with the air they are compelled to breathe. 
So tliat, while it might be the unworthy 
prompting of a foolish vanity, or of something 
worse, to claim a superior virtue, or any 
greatly superior wisdom, even, as the essential 
thing which blesses us above those who have 
ranged themselves as enemies against us and 
against the government of our common coun- 
try; yet it cannot be otherwise than wise and 
well, that both we and our growing children 
should fully appreciate our relative position 
this struggle, and the combined duty and 
cessity which lies on us to carry it, at all costs, 
to a successful issue ; that we and they should 
understand this with the thoroughness and ex- 
actitude which affords repose and confidence 
and hope to the heart which knows it is striv- 
ing for the right. 

It is impossible to over-estimate the happy 
difference between standing united in heart 
and interest with a dying cause, upon the de- 



m 
ne- 



11 

parted gliost of wliieli (Jod, the unpreju- 
diced nations of mankind, and posterity as it 
comes to read dispassionately tlu; liislorv of 
these days, must frown and leave their curse, 
and standing in connection with a trium])hant 
cause, whieli, notwithstanding some liuman 
errors, has ])een in the main right, in sympa- 
thy with the benign purposes of God, and pro- 
motive of a true human development and the 
greatest happiness of mankind. To be in the 
right, to see clearly that we are so, to be 
recognized of God, mankind and posterity as 
being so, is of immeasurable consequence — is 
not only of unspeakable moment to us as a 
generation now on the stage of life, but is of 
yet greater importance to us as a nation that 
hopes to propagate itself through many glori- 
ous and happy generations of the future. For 
if it be so, we shall live and prosper; no mat- 
ter what trials we are brought to encounter, 
we shall succeed. If it be otherwise, we shall 
fail; no matter what pride, passion and mo- 
mentary power may do, we shall miserably fail. 
1. What, then, are tve fighting for? Let 
us accept the answer from the mouth of the 
enemy. First of all, he tells us that he stands 



12 

upon tlie doclrino, and is figliting for the 
realization of it, that any States of this JJnion^ 
whenever they please^ have a right to loith- 
draw from all allegiance to the general govern- 
ment, and to set up in the ivorld for themselves. 
That is to say, according to the exposition of 
their own advocates, that this, nation is not a 
nation; that the laws of the national Congress 
are of no binding force, as against conflicting 
laws of a State legislature; that in the inter- 
pretation of the laws of Congress, and of the 
national Constitution, the decision of the Su- 
preme Court of the United States cannot over- 
ride the conflicting decision of a State Court ; 
that the President of the United States has no 
right to use the combined power of the coun- 
try "^0 coerce^^ a delinquent ^^ Sovereign Statey 

THE QUESTION- NOT NOW ONE OF POLICY BUT OF FACT. 

It does not lie in the line of our present 
observations to discuss the comparative value 
of the })olicy of " State Sovereignty," and that 
of a National Unity. Such a comparison, in 
one aspect, would no doubt startle us Avith 
images of perpetual domestic feuds and an 
unlimited disintegration of society, till this 



13 

glorious structure of free institutions tumbled 
in shameful and bloody fragments, and was 
whirled by a tornado of anarchy into tlie 
ever yawning pit of unmitigated despotism. 
In another aspect, the ridiculous lueahiess of 
such a state of society, even if peace could be 
successfully maintained, in this day, when the 
mighty nations of the world are not only 
striving for the mastery of each other, but are 
agreed in plotting to curb and humiliate our 
unparalleled and, in their view, impertinent 
growth of enterprise and power — the belittling 
and suicidal folly of such a policy would no 
doubt seem too absurd to be listened to by men 
of common intelligence and honesty. But this 
question we are not required to argue to-day. 
However the glory of such a policy may haunt 
the fancy of our enemies, it lies quite outside 
the lists of this war. The question which now 
lies under the arbitrament of arms is not 
whether it luould he a better -policy to have a 
National Government, causing State Sovereignty 
with all its glory to yield, but whether we 
liave or have not a national government, which 
within prescribed limits is supreme over this 
whole land, and against the operation of which 



the violent resistance of any part is a dreadful 
wrong and crime upon the other parts — is 
deadly treason. It is purely a question of fact, 
of a fact, indeed, which is so momentous that on 
it depends the posture of our lives and fortunes, 
and which therefore may not be put at the mercy 
of the wishes or the speculations of anybody, 
but must be decided by the evidence, by the 
unbendinc: record. The affirmation of this must 
be true or false ; and if it be false, then we of 
the North are in the wrong, and have been, 
during the last four years, outrageous oppressors 
and murderers. The converse must hold good 
with respect to our foes. 

THE ANTIQUITY OK THIS HERE8Y. 

Now the yearning, on the one hand, that 
this Southern fiction should l)e true, is no sen- 
timent of recent birlh ; nor, on tlie other hand, 
is the fact that such is not the government 
Avhich is erected by the National Constitution 
a recent discovery. Fortunately avc have the 
proof on record. In the original framing con- 
vention, they who argued in opposition to the 
adoption o])posed it upon this very plea, elo- 
quently pointing out its consolidating intent and 



15 

force, a result which they dreaded as tyrannical 
and perilous. In the speeches whicli were made 
in opposition to the ratification, as it passed for 
that purpose to the conventions in the several 
States, frequent exclamations of alarm were 
heard against its sweeping provisions. The 
objectors declared aloud their dislike and their 
misgivings that "all power Avith regard to war, 
to treaties, to diplomatic and commercial inter- 
course with foreign nations, to the currency, 
to naturalization, to the draft and support of 
armies," and other essential functions of a sov- 
ereign State, were taken away from the local 
authorities, and concentrated in the General Gov- 
ernment. The opposers urged, also, as another 
proof of the correctness of their fears, that the 
very preamble to this instrument declared it to be 
" the work of the ^jeople of the United States, 
and not a contract between the States as separate 
sovereign communities." In the Virginia rati- 
fying convention, which sat in June, 1788, Mr. 
Patrick Henry powerfully resisted its adoption 
on the plea to which we have just alluded. 
'' That this instrument constitutes a consolidated 
government," said he, " is demonstrably clear ; 
and the danger of such a government is, to my 



16 

mind, very striking. I have the highest vener- 
ation ibr those Q-entlenien wlio formed this 
Constitution; but, Sir, give me leave to de- 
mand, What right had they to say, ^Ve the 
people of these United States ? Who authorized 
them to say We the people instead of We the 
States ? States, Sir, are the characteristics and 
the soul of a confederation. If the States be 
not the agents of this compact, then, Sir, it 
nmst be one great, consolidated National Gov- 
ernment. I need not take much pains. Sir, to 
show that the principles of this system are 
extremely pernicious, impolitic and dangerous." 
The advocates of the instrument frankly an- 
swered, " Yes, it is the work of the people of 
the United States." " The end sought by this 
framework is the consoldidation of our Union." 
In short, it was openly the purpose of the 
framers of the Constitution, and in opposition 
to a strenuous resistance, to render the inhabi- 
tants of all the United States substantially and 
truly one people, living under one common, 
supreme government, and known to the world 
by the national designation of ' the American 
people. This matter was well understood, and 
debated till there seemed nothing more to be 



17 

said, whether by the ()i)i)oser.s or the advoeates 
of its adoption. Upon this issue it went to the 
vote. The several constitutional conventions 
ratified it; and so, in this light and with this 
intent, it became, in the beginning, the funda- 
mental, and, in its own terms, the supreme law 
of the land. 

TUK BEGINXINO OK ItKSISTANCE rNDER THE COXSTITITION. 

The new machinery, started, as we have said, 
in the midst of many apprehensions in the 
most patriotic hearts, worked admirably, better 
than its advocates even had dared to hope ; 
and so great and manifest were its advantages, 
and the material prosperity which followed in 
its train, that all opposition, though not exter- 
minated, was for ten years perfectly silenced 
from the public ear. That silence was broken 
by the famous " Resolutions of 1798." These 
emanated from the Legislature of Kentucky — 
a new State and an offshoot of Virginia. 
Under the pretext of two inoperative but 
obnoxious laws, which had been lately enacted 
by Congress, known as "The Alien and Sedition 
laws," the one of which authorized the President 
of the United States " to send out of the 

2 



18 

country any foreigner whose further stay among 
us sliouhl l)e deemed by him incompatible with 
the public safety or traiKjuility," while the 
other provided for the special prosecution and 
punishment of libels on the President and other 
national oflicers, the Assembly of Kentucky 
passed a series of resolutions which, as it after- 
wards appeared, had been drawn by Mr. Jef- 
ferson, and which, though quite indefinite and 
ambiguous in phraseology, condemned the Alien 
and Sedition laws as unconstitutional and void ; 
and proceeded, among other things, to declare 
that " whenever the general government trans- 
cends the powers expressly delegated to it by 
the letter of the Constitution, then its acts are 
void and of no force ; moreover, that the 
general government created hy the Constitution 
icas not made tlie final judge as to lohat powers 
ivere thus delegated to itself ^ but that each 
State, having acceded to the constitutional 
compact as a State and an integral party, its 
co-States being the otlier party, therefore, as 
in all other cases of compact between powers 
having no common judge, each party has an 
equal right to judge for itself, both of infrac- 
tions and of the mode and measure of redress;" 



1!) 

also, that the co-States will concur with this 
Commonwealth in declaring the said acts to 
be void and ot no force, and will each take 
nieasures of its own in providin^u; that neither 
these acts nor any others of the general gov- 
ernment, not plainly authorized by the Consti- 
tution, shall be exercised within their respective 
territories." In 1799, the Legislature of Vir- 
ginia, in response to the call of her daughter, 
passed a series of resolutions, drawn by Mr. 
Madison, and essentially similar to those which 
have been cited both in spirit and in language. 
This was the first muttering thunder of the 
doctrine of State rights under the Constitution ; 
but as the matter was mainly one of theory, 
under which in fact no actual case of any great 
moment had arisen, and especially as it had 
been made a party hobby, called " strict con- 
struction," and on the accession of Mr. Jefferson 
to the Presidency in 1801, the political party 
ao-ainst which the "Resolves" had been fulmi- 
nated retired from power never to return, 
nothing more ever came of this demonstration. 

DXIVERSAL CONDKMN-ATION- OF TlIK IIARTFOUD COXVENTION. 

In 1814, the last year of the war with 



20 

England, tlie pressure of the war upon the 
•commercial interests of the Eastern States, 
whose shipping had already been almost de- 
stroyed by the British "Orders in Council," 
the "Decrees" of Napoleon, and the American 
" Act of Embargo," occasioned the meeting of 
the notorious Hartford Convention which in- 
dulged in the utterance of great discontent 
with the administration of the general govern- 
ment and in language which ivas construed 
and denounced as tending to disunion. This 
charge, however, the authors always repelled; 
and it must be admitted that the recorded evi- 
dence is barely sufiicient to leave us in doubt 
whether they ever meditated any overt acts of 
rebellion, or intended, even, to propagate any 
such doctrine. The doings of this Convention, 
though totally inoperative as to their own pro- 
jects, have become of great historic value from 
the decided expression of sentiment, in the 
opposite direction, which the occasion called 
out from other sections of the country, particu- 
larly from the South. 

The Richmond Enquirer of Nov. 1, 1814, in 
response to the rhetorical fulminations of the 
Hartford Convention, proceeded to say : 



21 

" No man, no association of men, no State or set of States 
lias a riujht to witlulraw itself from this Union of its ^)\\ ii 
account The same power that knit us together can nnknit. 
The same formality which formed the links of the Union is 
necessary to dissolve it The majority of the States which 
formed the Union must consent to the withdrawal of any 
branch of it Until tliat consent has l.eoii olitaincd, any 
attempt to dissolve the Union, or distract the elHcacy of its 
laws, is treason — treason to all intents and purposes." 

Similar expressions of tlie prevailing senti- 
ment of the country appeared everywhere, at 
the South and at the North. The reflection is 
forced upon us that the true historic meaning 
of the Constitution as well as its plain verbal 
force has been unmistakably obvious to all 
sections of the country and at all times, except 
toiler e and lulien its provisions and its spirit 
have appeared to stand in the ivay of the grati- 
fication of some laivless passion, or of the attain- 
ment of some sectional and selfish end. 

NriXIFICATION I\ SOITU CAROLINA. 

In 1828, General Jackson having just taken 
the Presidential chair, the Tariff was raised by 
Congress to the highest and most protective 
point ever adopted in this country. The bill 
had been opposed by the unanimous vote of the 
Cotton States and by a majority of the members 



22 

from New England, "some provisions having 
been engrafted upon it which rendered it unac- 
ceptable to the Eastern States." The slumbering 
embers of Southern State resistance now began 
again to glow. Mr. Calhoun, who from a 
bosom friend had become, through political 
rivalry and disappointment, a bitter personal 
enemy to General Jackson, now brought to bear 
all the power of his subtile intellect and indomi- 
table will to fan these embers into a flame of 
open defiance to the national authority. The 
old and never quite forgotten dogma of State 
sovereignty was revived into new vigor, ma- 
tured, elaborated and ramified by Mr. Calhoun 
and several leading minds of his school, and 
actively published through the State of South 
Carolina and throughout the Southern States. 
Week by week and day by day this doctrine 
was assiduously inculcated upon the readers of 
the principal newspapers. Year by year it was 
proclaimed with great energy in hundreds of 
orations on the Fourth of July. It became 
stock material for stump speeches, and not sel- 
dom was heard from the pulpit, the bar, the 
judicial bench. It was a great staple of con- 
versation at town meetings, in court house 



23 

lobbies, and in ])rivalo ^-atlieriiigs. The blaze 
was effectively kindled; and notwithstanding 
Congress, after three years, in the winter ol" 
1831, greatly modified the offensive bill, the 
fiery tide Avas not tlius to be ([uelled. 

TIIK RKSISTI.NT, OIIDINAXCK. 

In the autumn of 1832 General Jackson was 
re-elected to the Presidency without the elec- 
toral vote of South Carolina. Immediately a 
convention of the people of that State was 
called, which met on the 19th of November. 
The result of its deliberations was embodied in 
the ''Ordinance of Nullification," drawn by a 
special committee of twenty-one, and adopted 
by the Convention unanimously. The instru- 
ment pronounced the existing Tariff " null, void 
and no law, nor bindins; on this State, its 
officers or citizens." After the first day of 
February ensuing, it was forbidden that the 
duties imposed by the law should be paid 
within the State of South Carolina. The ordi- 
nance also prescribed that no appeal should be 
taken to the Supreme Court of the United 
States against the validity of any laws which 
the Legislature should enact in pursuance of 



24 

this ordinance ; that any attempt to appeal to 
the Judiciary of the United States from any de- 
cision of a State Court affirming and upholding 
this ordinance, should be dealt with as for a 
contempt of the Court so upholding and affirm- 
ing. Every office-holder of the State, and 
every juror was required to take an oath of 
obedience to this ordinance, and to all legis- 
lative acts which should be based upon it. 
Should the Federal Government proceed to 
enforce the law thus nullified, or in any manner 
to obstruct the foreign commerce of the State, 
then, says the ordinance, " the people of this 
State will thenceforth hold themselves absolved 
from all further obligation to maintain their 
political connection with the people of the 
other States, and will forthwith proceed to 
organize a separate government, and do all 
other acts and things which sovereign and inde- 
pendent States may of right do." The Legis- 
lature proceeded at once to pass the requisite 
acts, and all was made ready to carry the ordi- 
nance into practical effect. 

\VEHSTER OX TUE EXTENT OF THE COXRTITUTIOX. 

During tlie years in which tlie storm was 



25 

gathering in South Carolina, its echoes fre- 
quently sounded, through her senators and 
representatives, in the halls of Congress. The 
most memorable instance of tliis kind occurred 
in the Senate Chamber in January, 1830. In 
the course of a rambling speech on the matter 
of distributing the public lands, a senator from 
South Carolina boldly proclaimed, two years 
in advance of the actual birth of tlie '' Ordi- 
nance of Nullification," that not the Supreme 
Court of the United States, but the legislatures 
and the courts of tlie several States, are the final 
judges upon the constitutionality of the laws of 
Congress, and that whenever these authorities 
shall judge any law of Congress to be an over- 
stepping of its appropriate powers, they may 
declare it void, resist its execution, and, if they 
please, retire from any further connection with 
the general government. 

Mr. Webster, on that occasion, observed with 
unanswerable logic : 

" The gentleman argues that if this government be the 
sole judge of the extent of its own powers, it subverts State 
sovereignty. His opinion may be that this right ought not 
to have been lodged with the general government; he may 
like better such a Constitution as we should have under the 
right of State interference; but I ask him to meet me on 



26 



the plain matter of foot. I ask laini to meet me on tlie 
Constitution itself. 1 ask him if the ]>o\ver is not found 
there, clearly and visibly found there? 

"The Constitution declares that the laws of Congress, 
jiassed in pursuance of the Constitution, shall be the supreme 
law of the land. It dechires, also, with ecpial plainness and 
precision, that the judicial power of the United States shall 
extend to every case arising under the laws of Congress. 
Here is a law, then, which is declared to be supreme, and 
here is a jiower established which is to interpret the law. 
Now, Sir, how has the gentleman met this? Suppose the 
Constitution to be a compact, yet here are its terms, and 
how does the gentleman get rid of them ? He cannot argue 
the seal off the bond, nor the words out of the instrument. 
Here they are; what answer does he give them? None in 
the world, Sir, except that the eftect of this would be to 
place the States in a condition of inferiority; from the nature 
of things, there being no superioi-, the parties must be their 
own judges. The gentleman says, if there be such a power 
of final decision in the general government, he asks for the 
grant of the power. Well, Sir, I show him the grant. I 
turn him to the very words. I show him that the laws of 
Congress are made supreme, and that the judicial power 
extends, by express words, to the interpretation of these 
laws. Instead of answering this, he retreats into the general 
reflection that it must result from the nattire of things, that 
the States being, as he afKrms, parties, must judge for 
themselves. 

" Sir, the people of the United States have at no time, in 
no way, directly or indirectly authorized any State Legisla- 
ture to construe or interpret their high instrument of gov- 
ernment, much less to interfere, by their own power, to 
arrest its course and ojieration. If the people in these 
n'sjK'cts liad (loiic, otlierwise than they have done, their Con- 
stitution could neither have been preserved, nor would it 



27 

have been worth preservini;-. An.l if its plain provisions 
shall now be <lisrey,ardeil, ami these ih'W doctrinc^s interpo- 
lated in it, it will Iiecoine as feeble ;uid lielph.'ss a being as its 
enemies, whether early or nioni reeent, cduU possibly desire. 
It will exist in every State but as a poor dependent on 
State permission. It must borrow leave to be, and will be no 
longer than State pleasure or State discretion sees fit to 
grant the indule'enee, and to prolong its poor existence." 

THE ATTITl'DK OF THE PKESIDEXT TOWAUO THE TIUtE ATEN'EK 
liESISTAXCE. 

General Jackson, before his accession to the 
Presidency, was reckoned as belonging to the 
strict State Rights school, as the doctrine was 
expounded by Mr. JetYerson and even as it 
was still further expanded by Mr. Calhoun ; 
and in the collision between Webster and 
Hayne, it was generally supposed that the 
sympathies of the President were with the 
senator from South Carolina. But whether it 
be that his private sentiments on this point 
were from the first of a different character, 
while he still preserved, on other grounds, a 
political affiliation with these men ; or whether 
it be that during these four years of prelimi- 
nary agitation, new light broke into his mind 
which caused him to discard sentiments and 
prejudices which he once actually entertained ; 
the crisis, at all events, found him prepared 



28 

to meet it in a manner which history will 
never forget to point out, as standing in a 
glorious contrast to that in which a weak 
occupant of the same position, twenty-eight 
years later, failed to meet a crisis which, at 
its beginning, was precisely similar. 

Early in December, 1832, appeared a Presi- 
dential Proclamation, pointing to Nullification 
as Treason, and declaring the President's de- 
termination to strike down the first overt act 
of resistance to the processes of the general 
government by all the power of the nation. 

" The Constitution of the United States," the President 
observes, in that Proclamation, " forms a government, not a 
league ; and whether it be formed by compact between the 
States, or in any other manner, its character is the same, it is 
a government in which all the people are represented, and 
which acts directly upon the people individually, not upon the 
States. Certainly, the States retained all the power they did 
not grant; but, having expressly parted with so many powers 
as to constitute, jointly with the other States, a single nation, 
they cannot from that period possess any right to secede; 
because such secession does not break a league, but destroys 
the unity of a nation, and any injury to that unity is not only 
the breach of a compact, but it is an offense against the 
whole Union. To say that any State may at pleasure secede 
from the Union, is to say that the United States ai-e not a 
nation ; because it would be absurd to say that any part of a 
nation might dissolve its connection with the other parts, to 
their injury or ruin, without committing any oti'ense. Seces- 



2r9 



sion, like any other revolutionary act, may be. morally justili.jil 
by tlie extremity of oppression ; but to call it a consiitutional 
right is a gross error, intended to deceive those who are will- 
ing to assert a right, but would pause before they make a 
revolution, or incur the penalties of a failure. 

"But the dictates of high duty," he adds in conclusion, 
" oblige me solemnly to announce that you cannot succeed. 
The laws of the United States must be executed. My duty is 
emphatically pronounced in the Constitution. Those who told 
you that you might peaceably prevent their execution deceived 
you. They know that a forcible opposition alone could pre- 
vent the execution of the laws, and they know that such 
opposition must be repelled. Their object is disunion. Be 
not deceived by names. Disunion, by armed force, is treason. 
Are you ready to incur its guilt? If you are, on the heads of 
the instigators of the act be the dishonor ; but on yours will 
fall the punishment — on your unhappy State will inevitably 
full the evils of the conflict you force on the Government of 
your country. Its destroyers you can not be. You may 
disturb its peace ; you may interrupt the course of its prosper- 
ity ; you may cloud its reputation for stability ; but its tran- 
quillity will be restored, its prosperity will return and the 
stain upon its national character will be transferred, and 
remain an eternal blot on the memory of those who caused 
the disorder." 

THE SENTIMENT OF TUE COUNTRY IN SUPPORT OP THE PRESIDENT. 

About the middle of Jcanuaiy following, the 
President sent also to Congress a Special Mes- 
sage upon the same subject, in which he 
declared the most positive hostility to the 
heretical doctrine of secession under every 



30 

aspect, and again dissected the Ordinance of 
Nullification and the legislative acts which had 
been based on it, witli unanswerable cogency. 
The pe()})le of the whole country, though 
doubtless there were great numbers in the 
aggregate who sympathized with the nullifiers, 
sustained the President, at the South as well 
as at the North, in overwhelming majorities. 
In those States, even, which three months be- 
fore had shown great majorities against his 
re-election, a sweeping enthusiasm now pre- 
vailed with the determination to sustain the 
President to the uttermost in his grapple with 
rampant treason. In the principal cities of all 
the States, except of course the delinquent 
herself, and one sympathizing sister, great 
public meetings were held in which men of 
all political parties vied with one another in 
applauding the course which the President 
had adopted and in promising him every 
assistance in his ])urpose of preserving the 
unity and life of the J Republic. Virginia, 
alone, exhibited any official sympathy with 
the nullifying State. Her legislature sent a 
commissioner to South Carolina to signify her 
fraternal regard; and lier (Jovernor, John 



31 

Floyd, the father of the late John B. Floyd, 
Mr. Buchanan's Secretary of War, in his annual 
Message said something about " opposing by 
force the passage of a Federal army southward 
through the Old Dominion on an errand of 
subjugation." 

THE C'OLLAPSK OF MI.l.IFICATKlN. 

But the movement of such an army never 
became necessary. As early as the Gth of 
November preceding. General Scott had been 
ordered to Charleston "for the purpose of 
superintending the safety of the ports of the 
United States in that vicinity." Confidential 
orders of a most stringent character were sent 
to the Collector of the port of Charleston; 
and such a military and naval force as could 
be immediately brought to the spot were con- 
centrated in the harbor and adjacent forts. 
The means of prevention proved sufficient. 
No collision occurred. No overt act of resist- 
ance was attempted. 

Meantime Congress had taken up the subject 
of the Tariff; and a bill still further reducing 
the rates had been reported from the Com- 
mittee of Ways and Means. This bill lingered 



32 

long- ill debate and never was passed, a com- 
promise measure, introduced by Mr. Clay re- 
ducing the imposts by tenths annually for ten 
years, until in 1842 and thenceforward the 
maximum duty should be twenty per cent., 
being finally enacted in the last days of the 
session. The debate of the measure, however, 
in Congress, afforded the necessary pretext to 
save the honor of the vanquished chivalry. 
" A few days before the 1st of February, the 
Nullifying chiefs met at Charleston and re- 
solved that inasmuch as measures were then 
pending in Congress which contemplated such 
reductions of duties on imports as South Car- 
olina demanded, the execution of the Nullify- 
ing Ordinance and of all legislative acts 
subsidiary thereto should be postponed till 
after the adjournment of the Congress." 

This was the end of that incipient rebellion 
which is known as Nullification. The manner 
of its collapse was somewhat unsatisfactory to 
many patriots, and among them, as is well 
known, to General Jackson himself They 
regretted that the question had not come to 
a more practical issue and a more thorough 
decision, once for all. They apprehended a 



tresli arisiii^i;' of the same lawless spirit, aiitl 
predicted, at that time, even, tliat the same 
issue would ije again brought u[)on the 
country, under (he pretext of "the negro 
question." How correctly they judged we 
have learned to our cost. 

THE MOKAl, VALIK OF THAT ABOIITIVK STiUliGLK. 

But if the question was not then iwactically 
decided and finished, it was morally so. It is 
chiefly for this reason that we have thus dwelt 
on these details. We have seen that the Con- 
stitution ivas endorsed anew and interpreted be- 
yond mistake by overwhelming majorities^ both of 
the States and of the people as individuals. The 
wdiole genius and spirit of our republican insti- 
tutions was discussed and sifted to the bottom, 
and the people, with the exception of a com- 
paratively small fraction, declared again, as they 
had done at the first, that the American Re- 
public is one nation, indissoluble and perpetual ; 
that the right of separation, at the pleasure of a 
single part, is a thing which is impossible ; that 
the only right which pertains to the case is that 
revolutionary right of violent separation which 
belongs to all men, under intolerable injus- 



34 

tice and oppression., and which has never 
been disputed. These results, at least, were 
developed from that abortive commotion 
of 1832. They stand upon the page of 
history ; and could not be made more palpable, 
though printed with stars on the midnight 
sky.-- 

THE GROUNDS OP A JUSTIFIABLE SEPARATION. 

It is conceivable, however, as we have said, 
that a violent separation of a minority, even 
from the most legitimate government in the 
world, should be a justifiable act, because an 
act of righteous revolution in self-defense. It 
is possible to conceive that injustice and op- 
pression should have been so heaped upon a 
part of the nation, by the General Government, 
as to render it not only the inalienable right 
of the injured party, but also a sacred duty 
to their children, to resist and tear themselves 



* It has seemed to mo quite unnecessary, besides savoring of pretensions 
which I have no desire to make, to fortify in a separate note each historic 
statement by a reference to authorities. The longer quotations constitute their 
own references which can easily be verified; and any one, I prebume, who will 
wish to consult original authorities on the minor allusions and general drift of 
my remarks can hardly need to be referred to the Federalist, Mr. Justice 
Story on the Constitution, Elliott's Debates, Niles' Register, Adams' Works, 
Webster's Works, the Congressional Globe, the file of any trustworthy newspaper 
during the last thirty years, the autobiography of General Scott, and I will ven- 
ture to add, an eixellent, though as it appears to me a somewhat over-colored 
and partisan chapter on State Rights in Mr. Greeley's American Conflict. 



35 

away from intolerable tyranny by force and 
blood, regardless of the damage, even, to the 
old offending government and people. Such 
were the clear grounds of the immortal strug- 
gle of our fathers for our own inde])endence. 

TlIK CLAIM OK INJIUV. 

2. What, then, in the next place, are the 
specifications of intolerable injustice and ojjpres- 
sion which are claimed by our foes to have 
been inflicted by the General Government on 
the States or the people of the States now in 
rebellion, and which confer upon them the 
revolutionary right — the right of nature — to 
tear themselves out from the nation, to dis- 
member the national territory, to cripple the 
national resources, to humiliate the national 
honor, to wound the national credit, to under- 
mine the confidence of the world in the stability 
of our institutions, to sever the great artery of 
our constitutional life, and to launch us unpro- 
tected upon an unknown career of disorganiza- 
tion and endless commotions and blood and ruin ? 

MR. STEPIIEXS OX THE WUOXGS OF TUE SOCTH. 

An able and eminent gentleman of the 
South, now Vice President of the Southern 



36 

Conroderaey, a\ lieu resisting to the last moment 
the revoliitionaiy act of the Convention which 
met at Milledgeville in November, 1860, and 
which finally passed the Ordinance that placed 
liini and his -State in the attitude of rebellion 
to the government of his country, stated 
briefly and well nearly all that can be truth- 
fully alleged on this point. 

" Whiit reasons," he demands, " can you give to tlie 
nations of the eartli to justify it? To what course, or one 
o\ei-t act can you point, on Avhich to rest the ])lea of jus- 
tification? What right has the North assailed? What 
interest of the South has l»een invaded? What justice has 
been denied? — or wliat claim founded in justice and right 
has been withheld ? Can either of you to-day name one 
governmental act of wrong, deliberately and jjurposely done 
by the government at Washington, of which the South has 
a right to complain? I challenge the answer. AVhile on 
the other hand, let me show the facts — and beheve me 
gentlemen, I am not here the advocate of the North, but I 
am here the friend, the firm tViend and lover of the South 
antl her institutions, and for tliis reason I speak thus plainly 
and faithfully to yours, mine, and every other man's interest, 
the words of truth and soberness — of which I wish you to 
judge, and I v^W only state facts which are clear and unde- 
niable, and which now stand as records authentic in the 
history of our country. 

"When we of the South denKUKK^l the slave tra<le, or 
the imjiortation of Africans for the cultivation of our lands, 
did they not yield the right for twenty years? When we 
asked a three-tifths representation in Congress, was it not 
grante<i ? When we demanded the return of any fugitive 



37 



from justico, or tlu! ivcovuiy of those jiersons owiiii^ labor 
or allogiancc, was it not iiicurporatcd in the Constitution? — 
and was it not ai;'ain ratiliod and strengthened in Uh' KuL^i- 
tive Slave Law of 1850? Do you reply that, in many 
instances they have violated this compact? As individuals, 
or as local communities even, they may have done so; hut 
not by the sanction of government, for tliat lias nlways been 
true to Southern interests. 

"Again, gentlemen, look at anotlier fact; when we have 
asked that more territory should be added that we might 
spread the institution of slavery, have they not yielded to 
our demands, and given us Louisiana, Florida and Texas, 
out of which four States have been carved, with ample 
territory for four more, in due time to be added? 

" Again, gentlemen, we have always had the control of 
the General Government, and can have still if we remain 
under it and are as united as we have been. A majority 
of the Presidents have been chosen from the South, while 
we have controlled those elected from the North. We have 
had sixty-four years of Southern Presidents, they twenty- 
four. Of the Judges of the Supreme Court, eighteen have 
come from the South, eleven from the North ; and while 
nearly four-fifths of the judicial business has arisen in the 
Free States, yet a majority of the Court has alwavs been 
from the Slave States. This we have i('i|iilifd, to guard 
against any interpretation of the Constitution unfavorable to 
us. Of tenn)orary presiding oflScers of the Senate we have 
had twenty-four, they eleven. While the majoritv of repre- 
sentatives, from their greater poindation, liavi' always been 
from the North, yet we have generally secured the Speaker, 
which we have demanded, because lie to a great extent 
shapes the legislation of the country. Of Attorney Generals 
we have had fourteen, the North five. Of Foreign Minis- 
ters we have had eighty-six, they forty-four. While three- 
fourths of the business which demands diplomatic agents 



38 



abroad is clearly iVom the North, i'rom their greater com- 
mercial interests, yet we have had the ])rincipal embassies 
in order to secure the world's markets for our cotton, 
tobacco and sugar on the best possible terms. We have 
had a vast majority of the higher offices of both army and 
navy, though a larger portion of both soldiers and sailors 
were drawn from the North. It is equally so of clerks, 
auditors and comptrollers, fiUing the Executive Department; 
the records show that for the last fifty years, of the three 
thousand thus employed we have had more than two-thirds, 
while we are but one-third of the white population of the 
repubhc. 

" Look at another item, that of the revenue or the means of 
supporting the government. From official documents we 
learn that a fraction over three-fourths of the revenue col- 
lected for the support of the government has uniformly 
been raised from the North. 

" Look at anotlier branch of the government, the Mail" 
and Post Office Department. The Postmaster General 
reports, for 1860, the expense for transportation in the Free 
States a little over thirteen millions, the income, nineteen 
millions ; in the Slave States, the transportation nearly fifteen 
millions, the income, eight millions; leaving a deficit of 
nearly seven millions to be supplied by the North for our 
accommodation, and without which we must have been cut 
off from this most essential branch of the government. 

" For w hat, then, I ask again, are the thousands and tens 
of thousands of your sons and brothers to be slain in 
battle? Is it for the overthrow of the American Govern- 
ment, established by our common ancestry, cemented and 
built up by their sweat and blood, and founded on the 
broad principles of right, justice and humanity ? For 
my part, I must declare it, as the wisest statesmen and 
patriots of this or any land have often done before me, the 
best and freest government— the most equal in its distribu- 



39 

tion of rights — the most just in its decisions of conflicting 
claims — the most lenient in its processes — the most in- 
spiring in its measures to elevate the race of man — that 
the sun in heaven ever shone upon. To attempt tlic over- 
throw of sucli a government, umlci- uhich w.- liavc lived 
for more than three-(|uarters of a cmtui), in which we 
have gained our wealth, secure<l our standing as a nation, 
enjoyed domestic safety while the elements of ]icril were 
surging around us, with peace, tranquihty, unliouiidf"] pros- 
perity and rights unassailed — this I regard as the extremity 
of madness, the height of folly and of wickedness to which 
I can neither lend my sanction nor my vote." 

These are the words of an enhghtened 
Southerner, on the very floor of that ill-starred 
Convention which passed the Ordinance of 
Secession that robbed him, and thousands who 
held similar sentiments, of a country and a 
government which they loved, and against 
their earnest struggles, threw them helpless 
into the arms of an outrageous rebellion. 
They are, moreover, as he claims, beyond all 
question "the words of truth and soberness." 
Here are the facts and the figures. They stand 
unanswered, for they are unanswerable. So 
far from having been the victim of injustice 
and oppression, at the hands of the General 
Government, the South has notoriously been 
the petted child and the spoiled child of the 
Government from the beojinninf]^. 



40 



TUE TRUE ORIOIX OP THE WAR 



Enongli lias been said, perhaps your patience 
has been taxed longer than was necessary, to 
demonstrate beyond all answer on which side 
of this contest the balance of legal justice and 
of moral right inclines. But this contest did 
not originate in any sense of injury or wrong. 
Born of a mistaken .but lawless and unscru- 
pulous ambition for Southern independence and 
a slave oligarchy, it could not he 'prevented. 
Its leaders were resolved, and had been for 
more than a generation resolved, to bring 
it to the terrible hazard of arms. It was 
written, too, in the plans of the Almighty to 
test the metal of our patriotism, to draw out 
and consolidate our national strength, and to 
rid the land of the curse of slavery which 
was sadly entailed by our ancestors on this 
fair home of freedom. 

The true cause of this contest, let us dis- 
tinctly repeat, was and still is the desire and 
deternfiination^ at all hazay'ds^ to open an un- 
bounded extension^ both in territory and in time^ 
for the accursed institution of slavery^ coupled 
loitJi, the congenital lust for a more aristocratic 



41 

state of society^ than 'prevails among the indus- 
trious and equalized masses of the North — two 
darling ami dazzling objects, tliaii wliicli, it is 
certain, notliing conld have l)een more opposite 
to the intent of the framers of our Constitution, 
and which it was plainly impossible ever to real- 
ize under the peaceful and legal operation of its 
provisions. No other sufficient motive, under 
the circumstances, is conceivable ; and no other 
has ever been alleged, even, which is not 
utterly without any real foundation in flict. 
This it was which brought us to the in- 
evitable alternative that three hundred thousand 
slaveholders, numbering with their wives and 
children, at the largest estimate, less than two 
millions of white population, must have their 
aristocratic will, and dominate, unchecked, not 
only over their four millions of African slaves, 
but also over twenty-two millions of co-equal 
citizens at the North — this mere fraction of 
the people of the nation, fired by the lust of 
slavery, and haughty with contempt of labor, 
must be allowed in all things to arbitrate the 
destinies of the nation, or rather to arbitrate 
the overthrow of the nation, to rend our 
venerable and precious Constitution which has 



42 

been the palladium of all our liberty, pros- 
perity and glory, to humiliate every sentiment 
of nationality in our bosoms, to drag that 
lovely emblem of our great and mighty Union, 
the Stars and Stripes, in soiled tatters through 
the dust, to set a terrible example on our 
shores of open and successful resistance to 
lawful government, to rob five-sixths of the 
actual white population of the country of half 
their territorial patrimony, their finest sea- 
ports, their largest navigable rivers, their 
interest in the profits of the four greatest 
commercial staples of the world — in short, 
must be allowed to perpetrate the highest 
possible civil and financial wrong on five-sixths 
of their equal fellow-countrymen, and inflict a 
fearful wound upon the national life, the fiital 
issues of which no finite mind can now fore- 
see — or we must accept the stern arbitrament 
of arms into which tliey precipitated themselves 
and us. 

A GROUND OP PRE'SENT NATIONAL THANKSGIVING. 

We call upon you, therefore, fellow-citizens, 
to rejoice with devout thanksgiving to that mer- 
t'iful Providence wliich, in the unwelcome straits 



43 

and severities of this contest, has phiced yon 
on snch palpable and shining- t'oniidatioiis of 
right, duty and necessity. We call upon you 
to be devoutly glnd tliiit you find voui'solves 
embarked in sudi a cause as may well give 
you heart to endure with a, clieerful patience 
its heaviest burdens, and to tln-ow yourselves 
with the whole energy of your mind, body 
and estate into a struggle which you can 
intelligently feel that God must, in all its great 
outlines, approve, which the unprejudiced na- 
tions of mankind must applaud, and for sup- 
porting which to a successful issue unborn 
generations. Southern as well as Northern, will 
rise up and call you blessed. 

THE PRESEXT ATTITLDE OF SLAVERY. 

Now a w^ord upon a point which once was 
delicate and difficult. Slavery — once wedded 
in accursed yet lawful embraces with both 
Church and State, a principal cause or occasion 
of this war, without which no civil war among 
us would have arisen or could have been 
excited, and which from the beginning of 
our national existence has given deep anxiety 
to many a patriotic heart and roused many a 



44 

restless complaint — luill cause neither complaint 
nor anxiety in our children. That horrible 
thin<2,-, bound to us, nevertheless, by the cove- 
nant of a sacred and indissoluble wedlock, and 
which a year ago many honest patriots would 
have bartered much, in spite of its treachery, 
to save, is to-day too far gone to be saved or 
to be worth the saving. The mortal arrow 
which was discharged at its head on the First 
of January, 1863, from the Proclamation of 
Emancipation, will, it is now evident, carry to 
the mark. It is equally evident that, had that 
weapon remained quiet in the quiver, yet 
the bayonet of the American armies, in its 
search for the heart of the rebellion, would 
also, of necessity, have torn the abetting 
monster's vitals out. Above all, in the house 
of its friends and admirers, if we may credit 
the prevailing voice of the Southern press, the 
last and surest mortal stab is about to be 
inflicted, under dire necessity, upon its wounded 
and withering body, by the negro levy of an 
exhausted and expiring rebellion. Who that 
loves his country or his children, or claims to 
feel ill his bosom the natural syni])a,thies of 



45 

liuuiiuiity, tlarc rcriisc |o join in the rvy of 
Anieii! IhUloluiah ! 

ItOKS TlIK C'AL'SK .I1ST1I''V ITS KXI'KNSK '! 

We hear mucli, iVom cTi'iaiii ((unrlci's, in the 
way of raiutlieartediiess and ci.niplaini at 
the cost of this ivar. Of eoiirse, war is ten-ibly 
expensive. Otherwise it would not be war, it 
would not be an engine of sufficient dread to 
smite down a powerful and persistent foe. Its 
three appalling costs — of money, of life, of 
limb — constitute the very energy of its cura- 
tive force. Let us glance a moment at each 
of these costs as applied to our own case. 

It is a prodi(jioiis cost of money j and we must 
include, not only the vast values in property 
of every description which are involved, 
whether for use or for destruction, but this, 
in our case, on both sides of the conflict. 
Can any possible civil and moral result be 
worth such an enormous and well nigh incal- 
culable cost of money expended and of prop- 
erty destroyed? But tell me, sir, hoio much 
money will buy a free^ just and stable govern- 
ment f Tell me, ye captives in the Austrian, 
the Spanish, the Pontifical dungeons ! Count 



46 

over the days of the long years since the light 
has once greeted your faded sight, or the health- 
ful breezes of heaven have once kissed your sal- 
low, emaciated cheeks, and tell me lioiu much 
money you icould deem a g overnment ivorth^ 
under which thirty millions of tongues — no, 
presently a hundred millions of tongues — may 
freely speak their opinions, under which thirty 
millions or a hundred millions of consciences 
are free in the worship of their Maker ! Tell 
me, ye expatriated sons of Poland ! Cry 
aloud, each from his lonely hut in the snowy 
wastes of Siberia, or clanking the hopeless 
fetters of the chain gang in the mines of the 
Ural — send your voices, like the moaning of 
the storm-wind, across the intervening tyran- 
nies of Europe and over the blue, dividing 
waters of the Atlantic — and tell the American 
people, to save the expense of hoio many dollars 
you would advise them to give up their 
experiment of free institutions! 

But 2var costs life^ yes^ the solemn exj)ense 
of human life. In this fearful cost, three par- 
ties are deeply interested. In tlie case of 
every man who falls, it may be admitted that 
the country is a loser, a loving kindred are 



47 

incomparably <(rcater losers, ;iii<l lie liiiiisclf 
has lost all he ini<^ht hav(^ enjoyed in llu; 
fruitions of country, family aiul life. Such 
men by ten thousands must full. Can the 
nation spare so rmicli of its life-hlood? Will 
not the national pulse grow faint under such 
a depletion ? History teaches us directly the 
reverse. Their heroic names in the annals of 
their country are a source of national strength 
as well as of glory which their living presence 
could never equal. The defeated and slaugh- 
tered militia band at Lexington in 1775, the 
death of the inestimable Warren in the battle of 
Bunker Hill, the graves of the unknown dead 
in the national cemetery at Gettysburgh have 
added more, and while this nation shall endure, 
will continue to add more, both to the moral 
strength of her sons at home and to the 
wholesome fear of her prowess abroad, than 
would the presence of ten times as many 
untried living warriors marshalled for dress 
parade upon a bloodless soil. The warrior who 
falls in battle is not lost to his country. 
Every gory body which is planted in her gory 
soil is the seed of a future and perennial har- 
vest of national honor, permanence and power. 



48 
But what can compensate the hereaved 
fathers and mothers^ the 'widows and father-less 
children f We do not speak now of mere 
material siqiplies to such as were dependent 
on tlie lost one for daily support; for a grate- 
ful country will not allow the dependent 
families of her slain defenders to suffer in the 
lack of the necessaries of existence. But 
Avhat can compensate the pang of bereave- 
ment — the hunger of the heart after the 
impossible presence and sight of the dead? 
We admit that that affectionate yearning may, 
for a brief space, be 1 )lind to its real solace ; 
but time will not only lay a soothing hand 
upon the first spasms of grief, the hours of 
sober recollection, as life wears on, and the 
music of a delivered nation's gratitude, and 
above all, the proud honor, in distant years, of 
being allied by blood to names wlmch will glisten 
like diamonds on the page of coming history, will 
pay a ])ension, in the noblest currency of the soul, 
to children's children of the latest generation. 

But the man himself is gone; he partakes, 
it is said, in none of these rewards. Alas, how 
low and sordid a view of the career of human 
life such an assertion argues ! Is it, then, the 



49 

great object of our earthly existence, to eat 
and sleep during- tlio longest ])OSsiljle period, 
and when Inirird in tlie n-ruiind, to liavi.' the 
greatest possible ai^c put upon the tomb-stone? 
I will not appeal to the theoretic wisdom of 
philosophy : 



I will not appeal to the iron morality of 
Sparta, nor to the Roman mother's latest charge 
as she hung tlie shield upon the arm of her 
son: ''Return, my son, bringing this or brought 
upon it." 1 will not appeal to the inspirations 
of religion and duty, even. I am content to 
revert to the common instincts of undebased 
humanity everywhere, and to ask if a man 
have no interest whether his life shall prove a 
blank, or a glorious power in the world — no 
interest in the name he will leave behind him — 
no interest in the blessings he will help, with 
the gift of his life, to purchase for his pos- 
terity and for mankind ? Then are the aspi- 
rations of the race sunk to an equality with 
the swine; then is there, indeed, nothing worth 
fighting for, or suffering for ; then is the for- 
gotten spot where the old glutton, or the old 

4 



50 

libertine, or coward is l)uriecl more glorious 

than the young grave of the philanthropist, 

the patriot, the martyr, wet for centuries with 
thankful pilgrims' tears. 

THE t'OXDITIOX OK TUK MAIMED. 

Finally, there is the cost of limb ; which 
appears to some more dreadful still, if we ac- 
cept their words, than the loss of life itself, 
outright. The picture is held up to affright 
our gaze, of a nation filled with maimed men. 
But the sight kindles far different sentiments 
in my bosom. It is not pity that stirs within 
me. I doubt if those brave men require our 
mean compassion. But I have read of the 
legion of honor in the old world and I have 
found in our venerable Constitution that the cre- 
ation of such distinctions by legislative enact- 
ment is forbidden forever in this land of equals. 
Yet I see that the Providence of God and the 
exigencies of these solemn years can create a 
legion of honor among us in spite of the Con- 
stitution. T see men decorated with badges 
which are not made of a scarlet ribband in 
the button-hole, nor of a dangling cross of 
gold and IjriUiants, but of marks which can- 



51 

not be coiiiiU'ribitod, or stolen, or losl. These 
inalienable badges were obtained by no nn- 
justly successful rivalry or iiiwnini^- syeo])lianey 
to the great. Tliese decorations are given no 
where else but in the tug and smoke of battle 
and by the hand of God. Their glory is of 
that pure and exalted kind which excites no 
envy and stirs in the breasts of their fellow 
men only good will, respect and emulation. I 
follow them in coming years and 1 see their 
claims to veneration, gratitude and love every 
where spontaneously acknowledged. I see old 
age rise up to do them lionor and womanhood 
respond with smiles and ilowers. I see the 
tears of grateful pride on strong men's cheeks 
and enquiring children gazing with wonder at 
their thinning ranks, till the last of their num- 
ber is laid to his honored rest. 1^'or my part, 
when I reflect on these things, I feel satisfied 
that this war for free institutions is not only 
worth its enormous costs, but that it will repay 
its sniFering champions for all their sacrifices 
with a royal munificence. 

RVIOENCES OF XEAU ArrROACHlXG SVCCKSS. 

Will any body say that this sofnxh like an 



52 

nmvarranted assumption of that final success 
which is not yet attained^ and tohich no human 
foresight is able, at present, with certainty, to 
predict ? AVheu we remember how gloomy and 
dark the night was which had settled upon us 
at the close of 1861, when, surveying the 
Southern territory, we found tlie position of 
our foes formed by nature for defense and 
by art rendered almost impregnable; when 
we remember what an extended line of diffi- 
cult sea-coast baffled the watch of our slender 
navy and what immense fortifications had been 
built by the enemy on every harbor, inlet and 
commanding position along the whole coast 
from Virginia to Texas; when we recall how 
thoroughly the whole line of the Alleghanies 
had been converted into a military bastion, 
runnincr like a o^iant's breastwork throu2f]i the 
centre of the hostile territory from Maryland 
to Alabama; when we revive the recollections 
of the great commercial avenue of the Missis- 
sippi controlled by the enemy at its mouth 
and studded with defiant fortresses along its 
sharply winding, densely wooded and often 
precipitous banks, for a thousand miles into the 
interior; and then, reverting to what has since 



53 

transpired, recall the struggle on the sea-coast, 
at Norfolk, at Newbern, at Beaufort, at Cliarles- 
ton, at St. Augustine, at Peusacola, at Mobile, 
at New Orleans, at Galveston aud at minor 
ports, till with a single exception all are either 
firmly in our possession or sealed from all 
communication with the outside world ; when 
we return to the valley of the ^lississippi and 
bring to mind the exploits which have been 
performed at Forts Donelson and Henry, at 
Columbus, at Island No. 10, at Memphis, at 
Vicksburgh, and at the mouth of the river; 
when, finally, we come into the interior and 
follow the victories by means of which the flag 
of the nation has been planted, step by step, 
along the whole line of the Alleghanies, at 
Winchester, at Cumberland Gap, at Chatta- 
nooga, at Atlanta, till the enemj* is completely 
driven from his mountain -fastnesses to the open 
and level belt of the sea-coast — now reflecting 
that this is the result of less than three years' 
progressive movement of our army and navy ; 
that it is a result which has been reached by 
a steady and continuous advance, notwithstand- 
ing the inevitable mistakes, losses, defeats and 
discouragements which are essentially incident 



54 

and to be expected in every great campaign; 
that it constitutes, on the whole, indisputably, 
a steady progress of firm conquest; so that 
the enemy's territory, to-day, is barely one- 
third of that whicli he originally carried into 
the rebellion; observing, moreover, that his 
armies, notwithstanding the most sweeping con- 
scriptions, are greatly depleted and confronted 
at every point by superior numbers on our side ; 
considerino; last of all, that we have the con- 
trol of vastly better supplies, the resources of 
a twenty-fold greater reserved strength, with 
the commerce and industry of the world open 
to our hand, the prestige of decisive victories, 
the moral ^force of a recent and overwhelming- 
re-election, and the soundness of a cause which 
carries with its destinies the best interests of 
mankind throughout the world — on this large 
and sober survey — on this comparison of the 
situation as it was with the situation as it now 
is — we confess that we think we can discern 
the streamers of dawn shooting rapidly up into 
the darkness of our national night- — -that we 
can see unmistakable signs which tell that we 
are steadily, and speedily, even, approaching a 
final victory. 



55 



\C()N(irKi{.\rii,K S()r'iiii:it\ oisTdsiituv. 



lUd aihal do loe /niofi\ some dhjcctof iii;i}' 
usk, of the temper of the Southern peojde? 
How can we tell tliai tlicy will not, hold out 
forever? Have we not heard the assertion of 
their rnlers and public journals, that tlie\ will 
never yield? — will be externiiiialed first? — 
will sec all their cities burnt and their fields 
made a desert, rather than submit? We have 
only to answer that we take loi- lii'aiitcd that 
the Southern people are men of like passions 
with all others and are controlled by the same 
motives which have decided the conduct of 
all human beings, always and everywhere, in 
similar circumstances. We assume, therefore, 
that when they have come to feel, deeply 
enough, that their cause is hopeless, that their 
independence is impossible, that the war will 
go on, with more and still more terrible rav- 
ages, until they are ready to cry "Enough!" 
and submit to the established government of 
the land, they will not, then, continue to wait 
till the sword has devoured every male among 
them between sixteen and sixty and has ren- 
dered every inch of the soil they inhal)it like 
the desert of Sahara; but they will do, and 



56 

the most desperate leaders on earth could not 
arrest their doing, just what all vanquished 
people who have ever yet lived have done, 
however it might go against their wish or 
will, give up. 

At first they were deceived by hopes of a 
quick and bloodless victory over a people 
whom they had been taught to regard as too 
stupid, peaceful and avaricious to fight ; or 
should it come to the shock of a few important 
battles, that the warlike Southrons could be 
counted on as good against five times their 
number of peace-loving and peace-trained 
Northerners ; but though they found it out too 
late, they have found out that mistake. Next, 
they were buoyed up by the hope that their 
terrible invention of sea-going rams would 
demolish the blockading squadron, open their 
ports to the commerce of the world, and put 
it beyond human power either to exhaust or 
subdue them ; they have found out that mistake. 
Then, they relied on foreign recognition, and an 
endurance till foreign aid should come to their 
rescue; they have found out that mistake. 
Finally they seemed sure of deliverance in the 
supposed reaction of national sentiment which 



57 

had set in at the North ; they have lately Inuud 
out that dreadful mistake. 

What Ijarrier, then, now remains to Ije con- 
jured up between their submission and (lie 
glittering steel of our overwhelming armies 
which are surely bent on the inflexible purpose 
of their submission or their extermination from 
the soil? These armies, too, are now sustained 
by a moral power behind them which all man- 
kind must acknowledge and honor. The Amer- 
ican people have just declared anew, by an 
immense majority of the whole nation, that they 
will have but one sovereign government, and 
that it shall be supreme over every acre which 
has owed allegiance to the Constitution of this 
Union. If, then, mad rebels will continue to 
throw themselves upon governmental bayonets, 
we must with solemn but unfaltering decision 
say, "Amen, let the last armed foe be slain, 
let the laud be purified and healed!" But 
rest assured, fellow-citizens, that the people, the 
ultimate rulers at the South, even, instead of 
• that dismal alternative, will turn and live and 
will yet be, with us, a united and happy peo- 
ple. God speed the day ! 



58 



HOPE AND ENERGY. OUR SALVATION. 

One word more. Our troubles are not yet 
over ; nor were the troubles of the Psalmist and 
his nation over, when they sent up, for the first 
time, the inspired shout, " Tlie Lord hath done 
great things for us whereof ive are glad^ But 
the specific doctrine of that inspired moment 
was, to draw an assured hope for the fidure^ 
Old of the remembered aid of God in the past. 
" They that soio in tears^" they were taught to 
sing with the next breath, may know, even 
while their tears are flowing, that they '^ shall 
reap in joy. " He that still goes forth, even 
while he weeps, to carry and scatter the pre- 
cious seed, with an assured hope in God, shall 
come home with rejoicing, when his labor is 
over and God's own season has brought around 
the fruit, bringing the sheaves of his reward 
— a reward which is due at once and alike 
to the force of his toil and to the secret energy 
of his hope in God. 

So the tears of our luar at the longest will 
he over., in God^s good time. Noiv^ we are 
bound to sow in hope. Then., not merely our 
happy share in the untold blessings of a coun- 
try restored, regenerated and doubly beloved 



59 

will richly repay to us and to onr posterity 
every possible present sacrifice; Init the renieni- 
brance of personal costs honestly inciuTcMl for 
the common cause, while the sky hung- dark 
and doubtful above the liberties of the land, 
will be such a source of honorable and 
rapturous satisfiction as oceans of selfishly 
hoarded pelf could never buy ; and when, in 
distant years of national safety and peace, 
children's children shall climb our knees to 
learn the great story of these historic days, 
lisping with horror the name of traitor, it 
will be, I think, the sweetest earthly solace of 
our aged lives, to be able to say, " I sowed, 
through four, six, eight dark and bloody years 
in tears, that you, my darlings, might possess, 
established and intact, the thrice blessed gov- 
ernment which my grandsires toiled and bled 
to buy for me." 



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